Helix Talk

[the swede]

Revv Purple.

But it’s only in the Purple Stomp… and you can only play Prince songs with it. They locked it so you can’t create new presets.

 

[I S]

Revv Purple.

I'll get the stink-eye for saying this, but the Revv Purple had too much gain for my needs. I'm more of a SLO Crunch at 3-4.5 gain knob kind of player.

 

[DieSchmalle]

I'll get the stink-eye for saying this, but the Revv Purple had too much gain for my needs. I'm more of a SLO Crunch at 3-4.5 gain knob kind of player.

 

[I S]

Lesson learned. Stick with what works for you

 

[James Freeman]

I have found the highest headroom boost in the helix.

Heir Apparent
With input signal of 0.0dBFS it has 36dB of clean undistorted headroom, cleaner than a high voltage 12ax7 gain stage.
It even takes less DSP than the Pillars or the Minotaur.

This is impossible in reality because 0.0dB input is equivalent to 4.36v peak at the Helix input and to produce 36dB of clean undistored signal the pedal needs s 277v of headroom.

The combination of "Boost" and "18v" produce the unrealistic results, if it is a bug, please don't fix it.

 

[BenIfin]

I have found the highest headroom boost in the helix.

Heir Apparent
With input signal of 0.0dBFS it has 36dB of clean undistorted headroom, cleaner than a high voltage 12ax7 gain stage.
It even takes less DSP than the Pillars or the Minotaur.

This is impossible in reality because 0.0dB input is equivalent to 4.36v peak at the Helix input and to produce 36dB of clean undistored signal the pedal needs s 277v of headroom.

The combination of "Boost" and "18v" produce the unrealistic results, if it is a bug, please don't fix it.

View attachment 8513

Putting aside preferences over whose "Amp Block" is "best" ...... it is my view from a fair bit of experience with the Axe, Helix, KPA and GT1000 ... that the Drive Pedals in the Helix are 2nd to none.

Ben

 

[James Freeman]

My favorite is still the Pillars though, it clips like a 12ax7 gain stage with a normal guitar input signal level and also has a huge 25dB of boost.

Both of these drives have way more than enough level to simulate an extra 12ax7 gain stage in front of an amp.
The settings in the images are only to demonstrate the huge amount of boost these drives have, way beyond what is actually needed to produce a very high gain tone when boosting classic amps.

 

[Foxmeister]

that the Drive Pedals in the Helix are 2nd to none.

I certainly significantly preferred the Helix drives over the Fractal drive block models when I had my FM3 and FM9.

I'm pretty certain you could get there with the Fractal too, but that is probably going to require the use the additional advanced controls that don't exist on the real pedal.

I really do like the way that Line 6 models pretty much all the controls and dip switches etc that the real pedals have.

 

[Orvillain]

There is nothing like the Xenomorph Fuzz in the Axe FX 3. Not as a nice single block you can drop in anyway.

 

[James Freeman]

I have compared Helix's drives and fuzzes with the real pedals (or exact clones), the models are very accurate when done right.
Of course the drive models are not without flaws, some early models needed to be fixed like the RAT and DS1, and they got a LOT better with their recent fuzz models.

It is all up to the experience of the people who create the models, to me it is very noticeable with every update.

 

[SillyOctpuss]

I have compared Helix's drives and fuzzes with the real pedals (or exact clones), the models are very accurate when done right.
Of course the drive models are not without flaws, some early models needed to be fixed like the RAT and DS1, and they got a LOT better with their recent fuzz models.

It is all up to the experience of the people who create the models, to me it is very noticeable with every update.

I've compared clones I've built to models in the Helix and they're almost always bang on. Any small differences are no bigger than component tolerance differences in two 'real' pedals.

 

[pipelineaudio]

I have found the highest headroom boost in the helix.

Heir Apparent
With input signal of 0.0dBFS it has 36dB of clean undistorted headroom, cleaner than a high voltage 12ax7 gain stage.
It even takes less DSP than the Pillars or the Minotaur.

What's the point of the pedal then? Why wouldn't you just use a gain block instead? What does the pedal do that's different?

 

[HotRats]

I have compared Helix's drives and fuzzes with the real pedals (or exact clones), the models are very accurate when done right.
Of course the drive models are not without flaws, some early models needed to be fixed like the RAT and DS1, and they got a LOT better with their recent fuzz models.

It is all up to the experience of the people who create the models, to me it is very noticeable with every update.

I've tried, pillars, ts808, minotaur, teemah!, Ocd, kinky boost and hair apparent in front of my new mini jubilee and they all do a great job and sound 100% natural.

For classic rock territories the minotaur ended up being my favorite clean boost for the lead channel. Pillars came 2nd so far.

I've choosed the teemah as light overdrive for the clean channel.

 

[dk_ace]

My favorite is still the Pillars though, it clips like a 12ax7 gain stage with a normal guitar input signal level and also has a huge 25dB of boost.

Both of these drives have way more than enough level to simulate an extra 12ax7 gain stage in front of an amp.
The settings in the images are only to demonstrate the huge amount of boost these drives have, way beyond what is actually needed to produce a very high gain tone when boosting classic amps.

View attachment 8516

I’m so glad you posted about the pillars a few weeks ago. I had ignored it as another TS style pedal which I don’t frequently use. I revisited it in mode 2 primarily as a boost with a touch of clipping, and it is my new favorite.

D

 

[SillyOctpuss]

I don't really like the pillars when using it with the Helix amps and studio monitors but after James talked about it recently I tried the pillars into my jvm and it's ace. I really like it driving the front end of my amp.

 

[eggpl@nt]

I had some Musician's Friend points and a 15% off coupon, so I grabbed a Helix Control to go alongside my Helix Rack.

Are there any good tutorial/overview videos for Helix Control?

I'm too accustomed to how the FAS FC and FC Edit work, and I know I need to readjust my own paradigm to get the most of this.

 

[James Freeman]

Are there any good tutorial/overview videos for Helix Control?

I think RTFM will be best.
There are a lot of Notes/Shortcuts/Tips in every page in the manual that teach more than hours of random youtube videos.

https://line6.com/support/manuals/helix-control/

 

[MirrorProfiles]

I can’t really get on with a lot of the Helix boosts, but Pillars is one that does work for me. Odd because I had the real pedal and didn’t care for it. Same for the Horizon Drive, I like the Helix version more than the real thing.

Can’t jive with the SD-1 or TS808 in Helix and I don’t know why.

 

[paisleywookiee]

Looking at Eventide H9 Max used pedals, however, as good as the effects are, I fucking detest using apps, plus the H9 is limited to one fracking algo at a time.

So the question is, I’m seeing HXFX used for the same price, maybe even less. Is this a dumb purchase? I’d be using it for the weirder tones, and/or tones I use less often, like tremolo, flanger, synthy stuff, etc. It’s bigger too, but who cares about that?

 

[Lysander]

So the question is, I’m seeing HXFX used for the same price, maybe even less. Is this a dumb purchase? I’d be using it for the weirder tones, and/or tones I use less often, like tremolo, flanger, synthy stuff, etc. It’s bigger too, but who cares about that?

The HXFX is really good; there's a reason you'll see it on a lot of pro musician pedalboards these days.

Its main problem is that it has a very specific use case, so the value proposition is not as good as the rest of the Helix line. The HXFX is great for live use, but it also costs roughly the same as a new HX Stomp, and the latter might be a much better buy for some people.